We’ve all been there. Been told that ‘a real man’ wouldn’t do that or to ‘man up’. YAWN.

The fact is that over half of us have been told that ‘real men’ have to behave a certain way. Those outdated masculinity stereotypes might have been the norm decades ago, but times have changed, bro. You do you!

We linked up with Ditch The Label, an anti-bullying charity, to help stop bullying and shed those old expectations of masculinity once and for all. So far, we’ve supported 1,582,079 young people through some pretty tough times and we ain’t stopping there.

PAQ x LYNX UNLABELLED

We teamed up with streetwear and fashion dons, PAQ, to chat about what it means to be a guy today and break down the labels that hold us back. Watch the episode above and see what we got up to.

Research

We wanted to understand this issue better. So, we got together with the brains over at Promundo to get some statistics on the state of masculinity and bullying to understand how these old-school pressures and stereotypes are effecting young guys.

They told us that over 50% of guys have been told ‘real men’ have to behave in a certain way. What’s all that about?! So, we went on and asked guys in the UK, US and Mexico what it means to be a man right now.

We found that a set of beliefs still dictate how we should behave. We call this the Man Box. No, not the place you hide your sweaty socks and private collection of ‘art’, but a set of ‘rules’ that say how real men ‘should’ act according to society. We say screw these rules.

3 in 4 guys had been called names for the way they look, whether that’s in the workplace or in schools. This had us SHOOK. But it also gave us an idea. We hit the Promundo lot up again and launched an in-depth look into bullying and cyberbullying amongst young men in the United States.

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